Chamber and committees

That is interesting. They often share the fate of their ministers, so, if the minister does well, they will do well and, if the minister does not do well, they will not do particularly well, although they are not always tied to the minister in that way. They try to help ministers to formulate and deliver policy, so I can understand your view, but the role benefits the governing party and it is politicised, so I wonder whether special advisers have an impact on the access of civil servants to ministers. Are they a kind of Martin Bormann-type character who stands at the door and prevents others, even senior civil servants, from getting to the minister when they might need to?

That is an important point. The Scottish Government has done better than the UK Government when there has been consistency in policy, with the private sector knowing that a policy is, in as much as it can be in politics, on tablets of stone so that long-term investment decisions can be made. However, the Scottish Government has not done as well as Westminster when there has been turmoil and changes of direction in policy.

Because the discussion is so fascinating, I am in danger of being drawn into it to the exclusion of my colleagues, so I will just touch on one more thing before I move on and let colleagues in.

Paul, in Scottish Engineering’s written submission, when asked about what effective decision making by the Scottish Government looks like and how we can learn from what has worked well and what has worked not so well, you said that what has worked well is the aerospace response group,

“as a response to the significant pandemic impact on Scotland’s aerospace sector”,

and that what has not worked well is the

“Reaction to the current skills crisis”.

Will you touch on why the aerospace response group worked well and why the reaction to the current skills crisis has not?

Yes, you say in your submission that open-mindedness is one of the behaviours or criteria that are necessary in relation to decision making. Auchrannie in my constituency is owned by its employees and it has 170 workers, so it is not always small companies that are owned by their employees. People sometimes think that employee ownership is very small scale, but it can be much larger and can even encompass sectors that people do not automatically think of.

Under our second item, we are continuing our inquiry into effective Scottish Government decision making. Today, we will take evidence from two panels of witnesses.

For the first evidence session, we will hear from Alex Thomas, programme director at the Institute for Government, and Dr Helen Foster of Ulster University. I welcome both of them to the meeting.

I intend to allow up to 75 minutes for this evidence session. We will move straight to questions. I will open with some questions; committee colleagues will then contribute.

In relation to the Tolley inquiry into the former Prime Minister, The Sunday Times editorial two days ago said:

“The civil service ... is one of the great institutions of state. Its effectiveness rests on its neutrality. That this is now in question reflects badly on ministers as well as officials. Civil servants must provide candid advice without fear of reprisal. But ministers must be able to demand professionalism and results from their officials without fear of a grievance claim.”

Obviously, that referred to Westminster, but is it the same here?

Good morning, and welcome to the 11th meeting in 2023 of the Finance and Public Administration Committee.

We have received apologies from Liz Smith and Michelle Thomson, who cannot attend today’s meeting. Jamie Halcro Johnston is attending as Liz Smith’s substitute. I welcome him to the meeting and invite him to declare any relevant interests.

The structure of civil servants at Whitehall—much of the civil service structure that we have here is more or less based on that—has been in place since 1854, when generalism was seen as the be-all and end-all. We are now in a much more sophisticated, high-tech society, and we have a lot of differences from previous generations. For example, contracts and procurement are complex and need specialist skills. Are we in a situation now in which we cannot deliver government without an increase in specialism and the generalism idea will just not cut it any more?

I do not think that anyone would want to replace generalists entirely. It is about the balance, is it not, Dr Foster? There is a concern about that. There is also a concern that people develop a level of expertise but, in order to get promoted, they get transferred into other areas of the civil service, and the skill is kind of lost.

There is also an issue about how some specialisms are valued. I read in The Economist a few weeks ago that the head of cybersecurity job at Westminster was advertised with a salary of less than £56,000 a year. That will not attract top-notch recruits in that kind of area—no offence to whoever gets the job in the end. If we are to get optimum decision making, where should the balance be struck between specialists and generalists?

Of course, consultants are often hired because the Parliament does not have the specialist capacity.

The next question is from Ross Greer.